June Releases

Sunday, 9 June 2013

5 Disturbing Films from the Lists on IMDB

**Please note that there may be spoilers throughout the blog**

Over the last year and a half, I've really come to appreciate disturbing films. I've always enjoyed horror movies and I thought that I had handle on crazy shit after seeing a few bad ass films like Cannibal Holocaust, Last House on the Left (original), some crazy Japanese titles but now I realize that I wasn't even close.
After watching titles like "A Serbian Film", "Salo", "Visitor Q" or even the "August Mordum" titles, I found that there is a world of fucked up that I needed to explore. So over time while searching for films, I've come across lists on IMDB that claim to have the most disturbing, the most twisted, violent, disgusting films. I would try to focus on these titles and watch them but some are harder to find then others and sometimes fitting them into a list can be difficult. However. there are a few of them that keep showing up on most of the lists, so I thought I'd take 5 titles that keep appearing and see how graphic we could get.

Here are 5 Disturbing Films from the lists of IMDB

5. The Last House on Dead End Street (1977) - After a year in jail for drug possession, Terry Hawkins returns to society with a chip on his shoulder and wants to get revenge on the people who put him there. So, he finds an abandon building and decides to make snuff films with some of his friends. He gets in touch with a porno director with a nympho wife and a producer with a clientele who enjoy the grotesque and bizarre. They like Terry's film and end up ripping Terry off and not paying him. So, now Terry has more revenge to dish out and kidnaps the Producer, the director and his wife to make a new snuff film!
I have to admit that I was swayed by the title of this one, the "Last House" bit really suckered me in but I'm a little disappointed. This film takes soooooooo long to get to anything good that when the good scenes finally arrive, I just didn't care anymore. Don't get me wrong the end is pretty brutal with this Mansonesque gang carving people up but there is no reason to care because the people being carved up should be carved up. The story is pretty dull, and it might be the version I watched but the picture looks like shit. They try and throw some sexy scenes as filler before the violence erupts but they end up making sex look lame. So, if you watch this, save yourself some time and watch the last 20 minutes of the film because it's the only interesting part.

4. Gini Piggu 2: Chiniku no Hana (Flower of Flesh and Blood) (1985) - While on a late night stroll, a woman is chloroformed and when she wakes up she is tied to a table. A strange man wearing a samurai helmet then starts to cut her up, piece by piece. Can she escape this raving lunatic?
Well, this was definitely better than the first, Gini Piggu movie. Still the same concept but it gets down to business right away. No more punching and kicking, it gets into the chop chop quick. This film is extremely graphic and the special effects team did a fantastic job putting these gruesome pieces together...well, taking them apart, depends how you look at it. There isn't really a plot, outside of a guy who likes to cut up people but if that's what you're looking for then, you should really watch this.

3. Aftermath (1994) - A mortician at a morgue takes violent liberties on a female corpse. How far will he go?
This isn't a full length film and only runs about 30 minutes but it is on a number of these lists and has been recommended to me, so I thought I would check it out. Again, like Gini Piggu 2, there isn't really a story here either but the work done by the special effects team is really remarkable. Watching the morticians open up the corpses and pull the organs, actually made me wince at times. Also, when the one mortician is left alone with the female corpse, those scenes left me with a some very unsettling feelings. Would I watch this again, probably not but I think that if you enjoy disturbing cinema and have a half an hour to burn, you should definitely check this out.

2. Angst (aka Fear) (1983) - After a number of years in prison for murder, this man is released and sent on his way. He stops a for some lunch and starts planning his next murder. He has his victims in mind, two young girls sitting at the other end of the bar from him but he has no place to do it. He finishes his lunch and catches a cab but while in the cab, his urge to kill becomes so strong that he tries to strangle the cabbie. She gets away from him and he makes a mad dash into the forest. Once he feels far enough away from the cabbie, he slows down and discovers a mansion with high gates. He feels that this place would be perfect to kill people and goes onto the grounds to investigate. It seems abandoned, so he smashes his way into the house, only to find a mentally and physically disabled man there alone. He hears a car pull up and an old woman and her daughter start bringing in the groceries. Now that the man has three more victims to play with will he be able to control his homicidal urges or will this man take this mansion for his own and fulfill this twisted fantasies?
I think this film was well done. The killer played by Erwin Leder (Underworld, Das Boot) is a very interesting character and he seems to explain using voice over, how he came to be the killer that he is. For a film done in 1983, the camera work looks very modern, thanks to Academy Award winning cinematographer Zbigniew Rybczyński, who does some really cool things with some scenes. There is some serious violence in this film but not as much as I expected. Which is fine because the real "Fear" is watching this killer and not knowing what he's going to do next and how far will he go with his intended victims. I found it to be a bit of a psychological roller coaster. I can understand why director Gasper Noe (Irreversible, Enter the Void) has cited this film has an inspiration and you will too after watching it.

1. Schramm: Into the Mind of a Serial Killer (1994) - Lothar Schramm is lying in a pool of his own blood and is remembering the last few days of his life and what led up to him dying on the floor of his own apartment. Lothar was a the taxi cab driver, wonderful neighbour and a serial killer that the papers called the Lipstick Killer. He remembers his last few kills and helping the prostitute next door. What led to this man's demise, you'll have to watch and see.
Although, there were a ton of disturbing images in this film, I thought this film was kind of fun. There was the murders of course, some necrophilia, penis mutilation but my absolute favourite was the little vagina monster creature that would show up now and then. It was gross but kind of funny in a demented way. The film is slow paced but there are some many weird things going on that you don't really notice. The acting is fine, nothing incredible but what you would expect from a rather good B-movie. The effects are good and simple, which makes it more believable. The tone is dark and the soundtrack works well with the film. Definitely worth a watch if your looking for something dark and disturbing.

These titles are really the tip of the iceberg and I'm sure there are more extreme films than these but what all these titles have are writers and directors pushing the boundaries of horror. Taking on taboos that you can't see anywhere else with films that really make our skin crawl. These films have left images and questions that will not be soon forgotten or ever answered, like how many nails does a foreskin really need? Who uses white paint to cover up bloody spatter and how many jars of body parts is really enough? I guess we'll never know.